Butter dishes are well known containers for sticks or blocks of butter. Typically, the butter dish includes a dish or plate for supporting the butter and a removable cover that is lifted off the dish to provide access to the butter. Several problems exist with such butter dishes including close spacing between the cover and the butter and handling of the cover when the cover is lifted off the dish. The close spacing means that the cover often comes into contact with the butter when moving away from the dish and/or when the cover is returned to the dish. This translates to greasy butter being deposited on the cover and then transferred to the region between the cover and the dish when the two are brought together again. Having butter between the cover and the dish ruins the quality of the seal of the cover to the dish as well as being messy.
Greasy butter may also be transferred to the countertop or table where the cover is set down during the process of removing a pat of butter and applying the butter to another item, such as a slice of bread. To avoid leaving greasy butter on a countertop, a user may attempt to set the cover upside down on the countertop, but this is often difficult because a handle for the cover may be on top of the cover so that the cover is not stable and may fall to the floor and break; also handling of the cover is difficult because it is difficult to grab an upside down cover.
Another problem is that butter left between the cover and the plate softens if left at room temperature but will then fuse the cover to the dish should the butter dish be placed in a refrigerator. When next used the cover will be difficult to open or remove and may even be dangerous as a consumer struggles with the cover.
A different type of butter dish, one with a hinged or roll top, tends to be somewhat complicated structurally and limiting in that such dishes only open to 90° and thus these butter dishes constrict access to the butter by a user manipulating a butter spreader. With such a restricted opening butter may accidently be smeared on the cover or on the lip of a dish.
Still another problem encountered with butter dishes relates to the butter spreader. Typically, a butter dish is enlarged to support a spreader. This type of butter dish may not fit in a refrigerator butter compartment. In some cases, a notch is provided to allow a spreader to rest on a dish and extend out from under a cover. Or, an outer support is provided on a dish or on a cover for holding a spreader. For example, U.S. Publication No. 2004/0011216 illustrates a depression formed in the top of a cover for storing a spreader. This arrangement results in greasy butter residue residing on the cover. U.S. Pat. No. 2,840,907 illustrates, in one embodiment, openings in the top of an interior tray for storing a spreader, and in another embodiment, spring clips attached to the top of the cover, the clips for holding a spreader. Such butter dishes that hide the spreader solve the unsightliness problem but none of the dishes have a hinged or rotatable cover where the cover offers a large opening to allow a user good access to stored butter (or other products) and where the spreader is secured out-of-way.
The invention described below addresses in detail these and other deficiencies of the prior art. The features and advantages of the present invention will be explained in, or become apparent from, the following summary and description of the preferred embodiment considered together with the accompanying drawings.